SAG Award Nominations Led by ‘House of Cards,’ ‘Trumbo’

“Trumbo” and “House of Cards” led nominations for the Screen Actors Guild Awards, taking three nods each.

Bleecker Street’s “Trumbo,” a biopic about blacklisted screenwriter Dalton Trumbo, took nods for best ensemble cast, Bryan Cranston for best actor and Helen Mirren for supporting actress in the role of Hedda Hopper. Mirren also received a best actress nom for “Woman in Gold.”

Netflix’s “House of Cards” scored nominations for ensemble cast in TV drama series and leads Kevin Spacey and Robin Wright. Edie Falco extended her record of SAG nominations to 22 — 14 for individual performances, eight for cast — with nominations for ensemble cast and actress for comedy series “Nurse Jackie.”

Idris Elba and Mark Rylance joined Mirren with double individual SAG nominations. Elba received a supporting actor nod for film for Netflix’s “Beasts of No Nation” and for lead actor in the TV movie-miniseries category for “Luther.”

“Wow I’m just floored and humbled right now,” Elba said. “It’s such a huge honor to be recognized by my friends and peers and for two projects that have really been such an important part of my life, “Luther” and ‘Beasts of No Nation. It goes without saying that my performance is shared with the tremendous actors I work with.”

Rylance took noms in the supporting actor category for his turn as captured Russian spy Rudolf Abel in Steven Spielberg’s “Bridge of Spies” and in the TV movie-miniseries category for PBS’s “Wolf Hall.”

Cranston will go up against Leonardo DiCaprio for “The Revenant,” Johnny Depp for “Black Mass,” Michael Fassbender for “Steve Jobs” and Eddie Redmayne for “The Danish Girl.” Redmayne won the trophy this year for “The Theory of Everything.”

“It means a great deal to be recognized by my peers during such a wonderful year of filmmaking,” Redmayne said. “‘The Danish Girl’ took a long while to get made and I am damn lucky that I ended up having the honor of helping bring Lili and Gerda’s story to the screen.”

“Trumbo” will face the ensemble casts for “Beasts of No Nation,” “Straight Outta Compton” “The Big Short” and “Spotlight.”

The three nominations for “Trumbo” underline the strong preference among SAG voters for Hollywood-based stories such as “Argo,” which won the SAG cast ensemble trophy two years ago, then won the Oscar Best Picture.

Jennifer Lawrence’s “Joy,” which won’t open until Christmas, was shut out. In the morning’s biggest surprise, comedian Sarah Silverman garnered a nomination in the actress category for her dramatic turn in “I Smile Back.” She and Mirren will face Cate Blanchett for “Carol,” Brie Larson for “Room” and Saiorse Ronan for “Brooklyn.”

“I’m honored to be nominated by SAG not only because they are my peers, but also because I’m overwhelmed to be recognized alongside actors whose work I admire so much,” Ronan said. “I’ve been lucky enough to be a working actor for almost 10 years and the mere fact that people can finally pronounce my name is pretty exciting! I share this with the whole Brooklyn family.”

Two other high-profile movies opening on Christmas — Quentin Tarantino’s “The Hateful Eight” and Will Smith’s “Concussion” — were also shut out along with Fox’s box office hit “The Martian.”

Jennifer Jason Leigh had been regarded as a likely nominee in the supporting actress category for “The Hateful Eight” but The Weinstein Co. opted to forego sending screeners. Those nominations went to Mirren for “Trumbo,” Rooney Mara for “Carol,” Rachel McAdams for “Spotlight,” Alicia Vikander for “The Danish Girl” and Kate Winslet for “Steve Jobs.”

“This makes me very very happy,” said Winslet, who has now amassed a dozen SAG nominations and won three times for “The Reader,” “Mildred Pierce” and “Sense and Sensibility.”

Vikander, who scored her first SAG nom, said, “I am deeply grateful for the opportunity to bring this poignant and courageous love story to the screen. I share this with the extraordinary Eddie Redmayne, the cast and crew, and, of course, our director Tom Hooper for making it all possible.”

Mara won the Best Actress award at Cannes for her role in “Carol.”

“The Big Short” and “The Revenant” were the only films to receive nominations without having opened yet. Christian Bale took a supporting actor nod for “The Big Short” and will face Elba for “Beasts,” Rylance for “Spies,” Michael Shannon for “99 Homes” and 9-year-old Jacob Tremblay for “Room.”

Tremblay, who is in Dubai for the premiere of “Room,” said, “I am celebrating my SAG nomination with my family in Dubai. We’re having ice cream sundaes tonight! Everything about ‘Room’ was amazing, especially working with Brie and becoming best buddies. I can’t believe it, so cool!”

In TV voting, SAG’s nominating committee largely opted for the usual suspects. “Key and Peele” and “Transparent” were the newcomers in the comedy series category along with four repeats: CBS’ “The Big Bang Theory,” ABC’s “Modern Family,” “Orange Is the New Black” (the 2015 victor) and HBO’s “Veep.”

“Mad Men” landed a drama ensemble nomination along with a nod for star Jon Hamm after being left out last year. The rest of the nominees in the category matched last year’s with PBS’ “Downton Abbey,” HBO’s “Game of Thrones,” Showtime’s “Homeland” and Netflix’s “House of Cards.”

The drama series actor category saw a pair of new nominees with Rami Malek of USA’s “Mr. Robot,” and Bob Odenkirk of AMC’s “Better Call Saul.” Repeat nominees were Peter Dinklage for “Game of Thrones,” last year’s winner Kevin Spacey for “House of Cards” and Hamm, who scored his fifth individual nom for “Mad Men.”

SAG voters repeated the same five nominees for female drama series including Viola Davis, who won last January for “How to Get Away With Murder” along with Claire Danes (“Homeland”), Maggie Smith (“Downton Abbey”), Robin Wright (“House of Cards”) and Julianna Margulies (“The Good Wife”). Tatiana Maslany, who was the sixth nominee last year for “Orphan Black,” was not included.

Ellie Kemper received her first individual SAG nomination for female lead in comedy series for Netflix’s “Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt.” The other nominees were incumbent Uzo Aduba from “OITNB” and returning nominees Julia Louis-Dreyfuss for “Veep,” Edie Falco for “Nurse Jackie” and Amy Poehler for “Parks and Recreation.”

Along with Elba for “Luther” and Rylance for “Wolf Hall,” nominees for performance by a male actor in a TV movie-miniseries were Ben Kingsley for Spike’s “Tut,” Ray Liotta for History’s “Texas Rising” and Bill Murray for Netflix’s holiday special ” A Very Murray Christmas.”

Nicole Kidman received some redemption for Lifetime’s “Grace of Monaco,” which opted to premiere on TV instead of in theaters following its world premiere at Cannes last year. She scored a nomination for female lead in the TV movie-miniseries category along with two other Lifetime entries — Christina Ricci for “The Lizzie Borden Chronicles” and Susan Sarandon for “The Secret Life of Marilyn Monroe” — along with Queen Latifah for HBO’s “Bessie” and Kristen Wiig for IFC’s “The Spoils Before Dying.”

The winners of the 22nd SAG Awards will be announced Jan. 30 in ceremonies at the Shrine Auditorium with live broadcasts on TNT and TBS.

The winner of the SAG ensemble trophy has matched the Oscar best picture winner 10 times in 20 years. “Birdman” won the SAG cast award and the Oscar for Best Picture this year but “American Hustle” won the SAG cast award in 2014 was shut out at the Oscars. “Argo” won both awards in 2013.

SAG winners have a strong record as an Oscar predictor in the individual acting categories. About 80% of SAG winners in the individual acting categories have gone on to win Oscars. The last 11 winners of the SAG best actor award have gone on to win the Oscar, including Eddie Redmayne for “The Theory of Everything.”

The SAG awards matched the Oscar winners in all five categories last year. Julianne Moore won best actress “Still Alice,” J.K. Simmons won best supporting actor for “Whiplash,” while Patricia Arquette nabbed supporting actress for “Boyhood.”

Nominations were selected by a panel of 2,100 randomly selected SAG-AFTRA members for films and another 2,100 members for the TV noms.

The SAG nominations are closely watched by awards trackers since actors represent about 20% of the voting members of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts & Sciences. Winners are based on voting by about 111,000 eligible members of the performers union.

The cast of “Orange is the New Black” won best ensemble in a comedy TV series earlier this year, breaking a four-year string by “Modern Family.” The cast of “Downton Abbey” took home the prize for best ensemble in a drama series for the second time in three years.

The nominations were announced by Anna Faris and Anthony Mackie at the Pacific Design Center.